Current Transmissions:

20131124

DAY THIRTEEN 19:53PM

Where
I Lay My Hat “Hank,
I can’t thank you enough,” Alice said as she dropped her backpack
onto the bed. Dust floated up in the beam of the flashlight. “It’s
really nice, and there’s room enough for everyone.”Hank
smiled, holding the light steady while Alice unrolled her sleeping
bag and Susanna started placing some of her clothes in the dresser.
It wasn’t the first time that they had relocated in the years they'd
been together. As things changed, so did the places they lived. Some
kept normal homes, most took to living communally in places like The
Rave. Sometimes they moved by choice, sometimes they moved because
their havens disappeared in a shift. New places and hangouts, and new
passwords and signals. And each time there was Alice, waitress,
college student, even an actress once, supervisor at a women’s
shelter, her world and her life warping around her, while she
remained constant, a beacon calling the lost home.Hank
realized that he was falling in love with her. He cleared his throat,
worried the women could somehow read his thoughts. “I always hoped
we could use this place, eventually,” he said. “ But it’s so
far away from, well, anything really. Except the other cottages on
the lake. Although they’re all abandoned too, since the land deal
happened. They were the last I heard, anyway.”Alice
smirked. “Unless that’s all changed.”Hank
smiled back. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. Maybe I should take Jo
and check out-“Alice
interjected. “Hank, it can wait until tomorrow. You’ve been at
the wheel for so long. Get some rest tonight.” “He’ll
probably be up all night escorting people to the outhouse,” Susanna
joked.The
rest of the cottage was bustling. Beds getting assigned, supplies
getting unpacked. A fire finally clawing into brightness in the main
room. Seeing everyone come together, work together, here in the place
where he spent his childhood summers… It made Hank’s heart full
of rainbow feelings. Every time they learned that something had changed,
Hank always tried to remember those summers, to make sure they were
still there. He feared losing his past most of all. Now it seemed
that his future, all of their futures, were at risk.He
frowned as he watched Johannesberg and Milligan check over the
hunting rifles they had brought on the retreat. He knew that Father
Donnelly still had that pistol Max had given him. At the thought of
Max the anger returned. The sense of pride and closeness he was
feeling flared into a red rage as quickly as if he had shifted.Maybe
he had… maybe that’s why he had so many problems throughout his
life dealing with anger. Something about his identity shifting… He
tried to hold onto the idea, the sense of it…Johannesberg
called him. “Hey Hank, will you walk us down to the dock?”Alice
and Susanna came downstairs as Hank led Jo and Milligan, both armed,
out into the cold night.“Things
feel…” Alice said softly. “It’s like they’re building to
something.”Susanna
took Alice’s arm in hers. “I know what you mean. Something’s
happening. We’re caught up in something. Maybe this Max is the key
to figuring out what’s going on?”Alice
thought about Max. She was still fighting the urge to call him. “I
just feel… That it will somehow end badly.”Susanna
shivered. It was unnerving to hear Mother talk like that. She tried
to change the line of conversation. “Did Hank ever say if this
place had a name?”Alice
smiled wryly, her tone sarcastic. “Maybe we should call it the
Alamo.” “How
about Helm’s Deep? They won that one.”